Cheer Games, a Barcelona-based mobile puzzle studio, has closed a $4.5 million pre-seed round led by Makers Fund, with participation from Play Ventures and a group of strategic angel investors. The funding will accelerate game development and support global hiring at the company's Spanish headquarters.
The studio was co-founded by Emre Gercel (CEO), Berkay Ozturk (CPO), Ertan Ünver (CTO), and Kutay Koralturk (CMO), all former senior leaders at AppLovin's Lion Studios. Together, they previously shipped Hexa Sort, a top-grossing sort puzzle game that exceeded $50 million in in-app purchase revenue.
The mobile puzzle category is one of the most competitive segments in casual gaming. Building a title that holds long-term player engagement, not just strong launch numbers, is a problem very few studios have solved at scale. Cheer Games is entering this space with a founding team that has done exactly that.
Hexa Sort became a benchmark in the sort-game genre and helped define what commercially successful puzzle design looks like in today's market. That track record informs everything about how Cheer plans to build next.
"We started Cheer because we believed we could build something more durable than the industry's short-term thinking allows for. To build games that become franchises and studios that become institutions," said Emre Gercel, CEO and Co-founder, Cheer Games.
The $4.5 million will be used to build out Cheer's upcoming slate of mobile puzzle titles and expand the Barcelona team with international talent. The studio currently employs eleven people and is actively recruiting.
Cheer's long-term goal is not to ship individual hit games but to establish durable puzzle franchises. That distinction matters. Many studios optimize for launch performance, then move on. Cheer's stated approach focuses on disciplined product execution, sustained player retention, and building IP that can evolve over time.
Cheer Games was founded in Barcelona, a city that has grown into one of Europe's stronger hubs for mobile and gaming talent. The founding team brings together expertise across product design, engineering, user acquisition, and live operations, the four functions that typically determine whether a mobile game survives or scales.
The four co-founders have worked together for years before starting Cheer. That continuity matters in a sector where team cohesion can determine whether a promising concept reaches market or stalls in development. The studio is building for longevity, hiring selectively, and prioritizing talent density over headcount.
Makers Fund led the round. The firm invests exclusively in interactive entertainment and has backed more than 90 companies across the value chain. Play Ventures, co-founded by gaming industry veterans Henric Suuronen and Harri Manninen, participated alongside strategic angel investors.
"The Cheer team has shown they can create fresh game concepts and then build the depth that keeps players coming back," said Curtis Urbanowicz, Investor at Makers Fund.
Anton Backman, General Partner at Play Ventures, added: "Truly complete founding teams are rare, but the Cheer founders cover every discipline that defines a top-tier game studio. That recent, battle-tested experience gives them a meaningful edge from day one."
